Potty Success

I think I can finally say with great confidence that Judah is officially potty trained. Hoo-rah. It really has been a miserable experience. But now that he is out of diapers COMPLETELY, I can't believe we lasted that long.

I am pretty sure it was especially frustrating for me because Judah is such a smart kid. I have been genuinely excited with his ability to learn things. The kid knew all of his letters, numbers, and shapes by two and a half. Colors were a bit hard to grasp, but for the most part he is a bright little kid. So why doesn't brightness translate into figuring out the potty? He showed all of the early signs that he was ready to train. He wanted to sit on the potty, tried to wipe me when I would go (don't worry, I didn't let him get far), could dress and undress himself, and knew all of the potty lingo from Elmo. So why was the kid over three and a half years old when he stopped peeing all over the floor? It was maddening.



So many people give and take advice about training a child. I don't think there is really one tried and true way to train. Believe me, we tried everything with the kid. We started out simple with the M&Ms reward and went to the sticker chart from there. Both systems interested him but neither motivated him. After that, we went for the naked approach. I would not put anything on him at all when we were at home. This worked pretty well from day to day as long as we didn't have to go somewhere. He would use the potty willingly instead of peeing or pooping on the floor, but once you put a diaper on the kid to go somewhere, all bets were off. He just didn't care.

One thing that really helped was a classic film titled "Elmo's Potty Time." Good stuff. The one downfall of this show is that Elmo instructs that your body will tell you when it needs to go potty. Because of this poorly worded phrase, my very literal son will scream, "My booty and penis aren't telling me they have to go!!" if you try to make him use the potty at a time that he deems inconvenient. Some day, when he isn't three, he will stop waiting to hear from his penis...I hope.

In May, Judah turned three and a half. I was sick of buying diapers for three children. One day I just decided that I wasn't going to buy him any more diapers. I was done. But I wasn't done cleaning up poop and pee. Many a pair of Cars and Dino undies were sealed into a plastic bag and tossed into the garbage. The true test came when we had plans to meet some friends at the zoo. I really debated slapping one of Mayah's diaper on him. Would he still use the potty if he was wearing a diaper or pull-up? Would he unlearn everything we had been through in the past few weeks?

After the inner dialogue died in my head, I realized that I wasn't willing to take the chance of having to start all over. So we put some undies on and got into the SUV. I warned Judah that we would leave the beloved zoo IMMEDIATELY if he had an accident. I thought all would be fail when we got to the zoo and discovered that the rest rooms were closed for cleaning. Are you kidding me? The friendly volunteer at the front desk directed us to a long hall and elevator that would take us to a rest room somewhere downstairs. Fifteen minutes later (and much crotch grabbing), Judah had relieved himself in an appropriate location.

Ever since our glorious day at the zoo, Judah has been accident free. We are a month into undies all day, every day. Last night I decided it was official after realizing that he had been through many nights clean and dry. Good bye, pull ups!